IN introducing the year 1868 we can do no better than to reproduce an article written at the time and with the situation before him, and published editorially in Herald for January 1, 1868. It is as follows:-

"We begin this year 1868 under most remarkably favorable circumstances for us as a people. The developments in the world among the children of men point to a very unsettled, and to them, a very unsatisfactory state of things. But to the eyes of the faithful, this fearful anticipatory state reveals the near coming of Him who is to unravel and disentangle the knots of difficulty, tied by the hands of evil and wrong for so many successive centuries. The Lord is fulfilling his promise most elaborately; for he is now pleading with men, with the voice of tempest and pestilence; famine and sword; earthquakes and the raging of the sea; disaster by the land and sea, till there is neither surety nor safety of life or property, either at home or abroad. Fearful times have indeed come, when it would seem that every man's hand is against the life of his brother man, to destroy him from off the face of the earth.

"And the saints are not altogether exempt; for 'afflictions' like those that are in the world have power over them. We may as a people congratulate ourselves upon the goodness of the Lord, manifested to us in the year that is past, in the signs following the believer, to an extent beyond that which many had hoped for; and if any have come short, to whom does blame attach if not to themselves?

"Another cause for congratulation is the unprecedented call for the elders of the church to declare the word of faith